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Thursday, 31 March 2016

Iran
Will Need Russia's Help to Build Its Caspian Sea-Persian Gulf Canal

Iran's
ambitious project to build a 'trans-Iranian' canal from the Caspian
Sea to the Persian Gulf will only be possible with Russia's help,
says Bahram Amirahmadiyan, an expert on political geography at the
University of Tehran.

Over
the weekend, media
reportsrecalled
Iran's plans to construct an artificial trans-Iranian canal
linking the Caspian Sea to the Persian Gulf. Negotiations on the
project are said to be underway, with the canal itself
expected to be commissioned in the 2020s.

The
project, which faces many potential
challenges that
must be addressed before and during construction, was
endorsed by former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad several years
ago, and in 2012, former energy minister Majid Namjoo calculated
that the project would cost approximately $7 billion.

Asked
to comment on the ambitious scheme, Bahram Amirahmadiyan, a
member of the faculty of World Studies at the
University of Tehran, told Sputnik that Iran will definitely
look for Russia's assistance, and that of other countries
in the region, to complete the project.

"We
know by the example of other countries that building a
canal to connect two major bodies of water is feasible. As
an example, there is the Volga-Don Canal." Tehran, the academic
added, has also taken an interest in the proposed Russian
project to connect the Caspian and Black Seas, known as the
Eurasia Canal project.

"For
now, due to the reorientation of the geopolitical interests
of some countries, this project has not moved beyond the
planning stage," Amirahmadiyan noted.

The
other project Iran is looking at is the above-mentioned plan
to connect the Caspian Sea with the Persian Gulf or,
alternatively, the Gulf of Oman.

"The
history of this project dates back several decades, and it is
rightly considered to be strategically important, since it
would [exit into] international waters. Accordingly, the US military
ships which currently operate in the Persian Gulf, and the ships
of their allies, would run into certain difficulties
in their freedom of movement. Therefore, considering
current geopolitical realities, such a canal has strategic
significance for Russian-Iranian relations."

Factually,
Amirahmadiyan explained, "two variants for the route are
being considered. The first is through an area between the
city of Gorgan and the Mazandaran province [in the north],
toward Sahrud, and from there to the country's central
provinces and the Port of Chabahar (Iran's only port in the
Gulf of Oman), and on into the Indian Ocean."

"The
second option looks shorter on paper, and would connect the
southwestern Caspian Sea to Abadan and Khorramshahr (on the
border with Iraq) with the Persian Gulf."

Two
variants for the Great Persian Canal, the western route (light blue)
and the eastern route (dark blue)

"The
second option looks more attractive from the financial
standpoint, and discussion on the prospects for its
implementation has long occupied the minds of Iranian
authorities. However, there is still no consensus on the plan's
feasibility."

Part
of the discussion on the proposed Caspian Sea-Persian Gulf
canal, the expert noted, includes focus on proposals to transfer
water from the Caspian Sea to central Iran to help
address the problems of water scarcity in agriculture.

"However, such an effort may carry its own negative
consequences, such as a disturbance of the ecological
system, climate change and other issues."

So
far in its history, Amirahmadiyan noted, the financial aspect
has always been the main stumbling block when it comes
to implementing the Caspian Sea-Persian Gulf canal project.

"For
Iran and Russia, if they want to implement the project together,
it will be necessary, in the current economic climate,
to carefully weigh the costs and to make all the necessary
calculations, because the construction costs would require enormous
investment."

"Another
important element is logistics. When the canal is built, it will be
necessary to somehow establish transit links between the
territories to its east and west, which will obviously require
additional investment and capital expenditures. Another issue [which
must be dealt with] is the difference in elevation between the
Iranian regions which must be connected."

Finally,
"in order for the canal to actually be navigable, it
will require a great depth, and a width which is sufficient for the
free movement of ships. And that is a big difficulty given the
difference in elevation between the Caspian and Persian
Gulf area regions. It will be necessary to equip the canal
with locks."

In
any case, Amirahmadiyan said, if implemented, such a project would be
of tremendous strategic importance for Russia, providing,
through Iran, a naval route to the Indian Ocean.

"In
the early 2000s," the expert recalled, "countries signed
on to the North-South Transport Corridor," a ship, rail and
road route linking Russia to India via Iran. "But this
project has [so far] remained on paper."

"Therefore,
for such a large-scale project to be implemented, it will
require a series of very careful and detailed studies, technical
calculations, consideration of the economic risks, as well
as ecological and even cultural evaluations. After all, our
continent has never seen such a project of such magnitude
before."

Ultimately,
the academic noted, "for Iran, this project is very important.
Iranians even call it 'Iran rud' ('Iran's River') –a big 'river'
which would flow across the country, linking the south to the
north."

​"If
the project is implemented, we will become witness to important
[economic] changes. First of all, Iran will get an unprecedented
new national transport network, which will modernize, optimize,
accelerate and simplify sea-based passenger travel and cargo
shipping, most importantly the transport of energy resources –
oil and gas."

"But
the final word on the project falls to the specialists,
to politicians and diplomats, who, through a comprehensive
approach, can give the project new life. Of course, this will require
the intensification of cooperation between the specialized
agencies of Iran and Russia, including the joint Iranian-Russian
Trade Commission."

Moreover,
Amirahmadiyan noted, "the authorities of other Caspian
countries too must not stay on the sidelines. States such
as Kazakstan, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan must also take part
in the project. I think that if an economic union of Caspian
countries were established, their joint efforts would benefit the
implementation of a whole range of projects related to the
Caspian Sea."

For
half a century, climate scientists have seen the West Antarctic ice
sheet, a remnant of the last ice age, as a sword of Damocles hanging
over human civilization.

The
great ice sheet, larger than Mexico, is thought to be potentially
vulnerable to disintegration from a relatively small amount of global
warming, and capable of raising the sea level by 12 feet or more
should it break up. But researchers long assumed the worst effects
would take hundreds — if not thousands — of years to occur.

Now,
new research suggests the disaster scenario could play out much
sooner.

Continued
high emissions of heat-trapping gases could launch a disintegration
of the ice sheet within decades, according to a study published
Wednesday, heaving enough water into the ocean to raise the sea level
as much as three feet by the end of this century.

With
ice melting in other regions, too, the total rise of the sea could
reach five or six feet by 2100, the researchers found. That is
roughly twice the increase reported as a plausible worst-case
scenario by a United Nations panel just three years ago, and so high
it would likely provoke a profound crisis within the lifetimes of
children being born today.

Under
the Ice Sheet

The
vast West Antarctic ice sheet sits on bedrock that dips thousands of
feet below sea level. New computer simulations suggest that the
warming atmosphere and ocean could attack the ice sheet fromabove
and below, causing sea levels to rise much faster than previously
thought.

The
situation would grow far worse beyond 2100, the researchers found,
with the rise of the sea exceeding a pace of a foot per decade by the
middle of the 22nd century. Scientists had documented such rates of
increase in the geologic past, when far larger ice sheets were
collapsing, but most of them had long assumed it would be impossible
to reach rates so extreme with the smaller ice sheets of today.

“We
are not saying this is definitely going to happen,” said David
Pollard, a researcher at Pennsylvania State University and a
co-author of the new paper. “But I think we are pointing out that
there’s a danger, and it should receive a lot more attention.”

The
long-term effect would likely be to drown the world’s coastlines,
including many of its great cities.

New
York City is nearly 400 years old; in the worst-case scenario
conjured by the research, its chances of surviving another 400 years
in anything like its present form would appear to be remote. Miami,
New Orleans, London, Venice, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Sydney,
Australia, are all just as vulnerable as New York, or more so.

In
principle, coastal defenses could be built to protect the densest
cities, but experts believe it will be impossible to do that along
all 95,000 miles of the American coastline, meaning that immense
areas will most likely have to be abandoned to the rising sea.

The
new research, published by the journal Nature, is based on
improvements in a computerized model of Antarctica and its complex
landscape of rocks and glaciers, meant to capture factors newly
recognized as imperiling the stability of the ice.

The
new version of the model allowed the scientists, for the first time,
to reproduce high sea levels of the past, such as a climatic period
about 125,000 years ago when the seas rose to levels 20 to 30 feet
higher than today.

That
gave them greater confidence in the model’s ability to project the
future sea level, though they acknowledged that they do not yet have
an answer that could be called definitive.

“You
could think of all sorts of ways that we might duck this one,” said
Richard B. Alley, a leading expert on glacial ice at Pennsylvania
State University. “I’m hopeful that will happen. But given what
we know, I don’t think we can tell people that we’re confident of
that.”

Dr.
Alley was not an author of the new paper, though it is based in part
on his ideas about the stability of glacial ice. Several other
scientists not involved in the paper described it as significant,
with some of them characterizing it as a milestone.

But
those same scientists emphasized that it was a single paper, and
unlikely to be the last word on the fate of West Antarctica. The
effort to include the newly recognized factors imperiling the ice is
still crude, with years of work likely needed to improve the models.

Peter
U. Clark of Oregon State University helped lead the last effort by a
United Nations panel to assess the risks of sea level rise; he was
not involved in the new paper. He emphasized that the research, like
much previous work, highlighted the urgency of bringing emissions of
carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases under control.

It
was his panel that had estimated an upper limit of three feet or so
on the likely sea level rise in the 21st century, while specifically
warning that a better understanding of the vulnerability of Antarctic
ice could change that estimate.

The
new research is the work of two scientists who have been at the
forefront of ice-sheet modeling for years. They are Robert M. DeConto
of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Dr. Pollard, who is
a colleague of Dr. Alley’s at Penn State.

In
a lengthy interview on Monday, Dr. DeConto recounted years of
frustration. The computer program he had built in a long-running
collaboration with Dr. Pollard showed increasing sophistication in
its ability to explain the behavior of ice sheets, but it had some
trouble analyzing the past.

Unless
global temperatures were raised to unrealistic levels, the model
would not melt enough ice to reproduce the high sea levels known to
have occurred in previous periods when either the atmosphere or the
ocean was warmer. The ability to reproduce past events is considered
a stringent test of the merits of any geological model.

“We
knew something was missing,” Dr. DeConto said.

The
new idea came from Dr. Alley. He urged his colleagues to consider
what would happen as a warming climate attacked huge shelves of
floating ice that help to protect and buttress the West Antarctic ice
sheet.

Smaller,
nearby ice shelves have already started to disintegrate, most
spectacularly in 2002, when an ice shelf the size of Rhode Island,
the Larsen B shelf, broke apart in two weeks.

The
West Antarctic ice sheet sits in a sort of deep bowl that extends far
below sea level, and if it loses its protective fringes of floating
ice, the result is likely to be the formation of vast, sheer cliffs
of ice facing the sea. These will be so high they will become
unstable in places, Dr. Alley said in an interview, and the warming
atmosphere is likely to encourage melting on their surface in the
summer that would weaken them further.

The
result, Dr. Alley suspected, might be a rapid shrinkage as the
unstable cliffs collapsed into the water. Something like this seems
to be happening already at several glaciers, including at least two
in Greenland, but on a far smaller scale than may be possible in West
Antarctica.

When
Dr. DeConto and Dr. Pollard, drawing on prior work by J. N. Bassis
and C. C. Walker, devised some equations to capture this “ice-cliff
instability,” their model produced striking results.

The
obvious next step was to ask the model what might happen if human
society continues to warm the planet by pouring huge amounts of
greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The
answer the scientists got is described in their paper in the dry
language of science, but it could easily serve as the plot device of
a Hollywood disaster movie. They found that West Antarctica, which is
already showing disturbing signs of instability, would start to break
apart by the 2050s.

Vulnerable
parts of the higher, colder ice sheet of East Antarctica would
eventually fall apart, too, and the result by the year 2500 would be
43 feet of sea level rise from Antarctica alone, with still more
water coming from elsewhere, the computer estimated. In some areas,
the shoreline would be likely to move inland by miles.

The
paper published Wednesday does contain some good news. A far more
stringent effort to limit emissions of greenhouse gases would stand a
fairly good chance of saving West Antarctica from collapse, the
scientists found. That aspect of their paper contrasts with other
recent studies postulating that a gradual disintegration of West
Antarctica may have already become unstoppable.

But
the recent climate deal negotiated in Paris would not reduce
emissions nearly enough to achieve that goal. That deal is to be
formally signed by world leaders in a ceremony in New York next
month, in a United Nations building that stands directly by the
rising water.

New
Zealand’s rivers are in a crisis stage with Government intent on
using the water to set up corporate dairy farmers. Rivers are going
“down the gurgler” in terms of flow and water quality.

Last
Saturday (19 March) Christchurch-based “The Press” in the South
Island featured a front page article about “trashed rivers.”
North Canterbury Fish and Game chairman said the trout fishery had
suffered years of environmental degradation. Declining river quality
particularly close to Christchurch city has seen rivers suitable for
swimming drop from 74 percent five years ago to 64 percent today.

Water
is a public resource in New Zealand and trout fisheries by Act of
Parliament are publicly owned. Rivers are valuable - indeed vital -
commercially recreationally and ecologically. But there is conflict
because of New Zealand government bias towards converting low
rainfall areas such as the Canterbury Plains and MacKenzie Basin near
Mt Cook, into lush green pasture for corporate dairy farming. That
grass growth in very low rainfall regions can only be achieved by
irrigation from the underground aquifer or water on the surface in
the form of rivers.

Dairying
in mega-farm, monoculture style also causes nitrate pollution that
leaches into aquifers and rivers.

The
government obsessed push for massive dairying expansion is an avarice
for money and export.

But
ironically world dairy prices have plunged making dairying a much,
much less attractive economic proposition. Dairy farmers, mostly the
Kiwi family farm, are struggling with low returns and increasing debt
levels. Corporates will survive and fears are overseas investors will
snap up dairy farms as the traditional Kiwi farming families are
forced to give up.

A
key to government’s aim to increase dairying at the expense of
rivers, is reforming the Resource Management Act to lower set
standards for water quality. Government intends to “reform”
freshwater management by amending the Resource Management Act and has
been carrying out a roadshow programme for public meetings. But the
itinerary shows government seems little interested in the concerns of
a worried public.

Andi
Cockcroft co-chairman of the Council of Outdoor Recreation
Associations (CORANZ) described the itinerary as “underwhelming”
with major cities such as Dunedin, Tauranga and New Plymouth left
out.

“Since
freshwater is a publicly owned resource, the token consultation
raises deep concern about government’s sincerity and questions
about any likely ulterior motives,” he said.

Ken
Sims spokesman for NZ Federation of Freshwater Anglers said the
roadshow series of meetings seemed token consultation.

“It’s
going through-the-motions exercise without listening,” he said.

Reaction
to the proposed reforms has not been supportive of government agenda.
Even the Greater Wellington Regional council covering the district of
the capital city Wellington and even government’s own environmental
watchdog the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Dr Jan
Wright told New Zealand’s Parliament the Bill amending the Resource
Management Act (RMA) went too far in stopping people having their say
on important environmental matters.” Proposed amendments
include giving the Environment Minister extreme power to shut out
certain voices and make changes to local council plans.

The
PCE said the powers granted to the Minister were “too
wide-ranging.” The RMA is now 25 years old and has been amended
many times. Dr Wright also made the point that it may be time for a
fundamental rethink about how to protect our environment and how to
plan cities.

It
is not just dairying that is a factor in declining river quality. A
number of urban areas still have inadequate sewage disposal.

All
in all however New Zealand’s “clean green” image vital to
attracting international tourists and giving New Zealand food exports
a “100 percent pure” brand is looking very tattered.

Freshwater
ecologist Mike Joy of Massey University has long been a strong
advocate for arresting the worsening state of rivers. as to
government’s preoccupation with increasing dairying of the
corporate kind, he challenges the sustainability of intensive dairy
farming in New Zealand, and the myth that the Resource Management Act
protects the environment.

“Nitrogen fertiliser use has
risen 700 percent in a decade; nitrogen levels at 77 fresh water
sites are up.”

Nitrates
leaching into rivers and aquifers are a major pollutant.

Back
in 2011 Prime Minister John Key was interviewed on BBC Hardtalk about
the myth of the country’s “100 percent pure” claim relative to
rivers.

John
Key found himself having to defend New Zealand’s “100 percent
Pure’ slogan as BBC journalist Stephen Sackur grilled him about
whether New Zealand really is as clean and green as the tourism
campaign suggested.

Stephen
Sackur cited Mike Joy, a leading environmental scientist at Massey
University, who had said “we (New Zealand government) are
delusional about how green and clean we are”.

“That
might be Mike Joy’s view, but I don’t share that view,” said Mr
Key when Mr Sackur presented him with the quote.

Stephen
Sackur then pointed out that Mr Joy was a scientist and would have
based his comments on research.

Mr
Key replied: “Well he’s one academic, and like lawyers I can give
you another one that will give a counterview.”

The
Prime Minister said that in comparison to the rest of the world New
Zealand is ‘100% Pure’, but Mr Sackur disagreed, saying; “100
percent is 100 percent and clearly you’re not 100 percent. You’ve
clearly got problems with river pollution, you’ve clearly got
problems with species facing extinction.”

Mr
Sackur said Mr Joy blamed decades of poor New Zealand government
policy.

That
was 2011. Now five years later government seems still in a state of
denial about the loss of rivers and the myth about “clean and
green” and “100 percent pure.” And the public’s river are
being sacrificed.

Tony
Ormanis a New Zealand journalist and author of outdoor
books

When
Nick Smith said making every river swimmable ‘was not practical’
did a little bit of you die?

Smith
visited Palmerston North on Thursday as part the Government’s
nationwide fresh water consultation, the night before a new five-year
plan to clean up the Manawatu River was due to be released.

As
the meeting turned over to the public for questions, a range were
posed of the minister ranging from swimmable waterways and the
Shannon wastewater treatment plant, to a protest rap, and a reading
of a few verses from the book of Genesis.

Smith
fielded several questions on why the Government was not aiming for
swimmable waterways.

Each
time, he responded that it simply was not “practical”.

“I
do not think a legal requirement for every water body in New Zealand
to be swimmable is practical.”

After
cheerleading for the dairy intensification that now sees many dairy
farms drowning in debt, Nick says it’s not ‘practical’ to
ensure our rivers can be swam in.

Did
a little bit of you die when you read that NZ?

This
is the NZ National voters have built.

The
Greens seem to be missing in action here. The Head of Hufflepuff,
James Shaw (aka Dr Invisible) looks like a possum stuck in the
headlights most interviews. I don’t want to sound like a trolls
troll but the Greens communications and political strategy looks as
flat footed as a duck. The Wellington clique who are running the
Green Party now are great at alienating people on twitter, but don’t
seem to be so sharp when it comes to making political gains.

Meanwhile
our rivers run brown with cow shit so National Party voters can drown
in debt.

Pisces
Sportfishing Fleet,
Mar 29, 2016 (emphasis added): ALIEN
FISH IN CABO? Jaime
Rendon is the well known and liked local captian [sic] of the panga
Dr. Pescado; he is also a great fisherman… he caught this strange
creature off
of Cabo today. It appears to be some kind of shark. He realized
it was something special and RELEASED it him/her back into the Sea…
Photos have been sent to local experts to try and find out what it
is.

Pete
Thomas (former
reporter for The Los Angeles Times), Mar 30, 2016: Mysterious,
alien-like shark caught
off Cabo San Lucas—
A Cabo San Lucas sportfishing captain on Tuesday reeled from the
depths a mysterious
alien-like fish that
somewhat resembles
an albino shark, or shark fetus.
But the bizarre-looking fish, with a distended
stomach,
was said to be alive when it was caught…

The photos appeared
Tuesday night on the Pisces Sportfishing Fleet’s Facebook page,
under the heading, “ALIEN FISH IN CABO?”… Tracy Ehrenberg,
Pisces general manager, has sent thephotos to biologists in Mexico,
and we’ve sent out inquiries as well, hoping to obtain an
identification. The shark – or shark-like fish – is somewhat
reminiscent of the infamous one-eyed
“Cyclops” shark caught
in the Sea of Cortez in [July]
2011…
the shark fetus was
pulled from either a bull or dusky shark…

Wire
Service,
Dec 4, 2014: Vet
Urges Research into Albino Dolphins Captured in Taiji, Japan —
Dr. Luca Giovagnoli [a Veterinary Medicine Surgeon] is urging further
research into the impact
of the Fukushima nuclear disaster on
marine mammals, after three
white dolphins were captured in close succession…
Albino dolphins are exceedingly
rare in
the wild, yet in
the last 12 months, three white dolphins have been captured…
“There are not many albino animals among cetaceans,” said Dr.
Luca Giovagnoli, DVM, “and they are not all concentrated in one
area.”… According
to NOAA Fisheries,
there have only
been 14 recorded sightings of
albino bottlenose dolphins since
1962…
“This in itself is already a rare phenomenon,” the vet explained,
“but when you tie the capture of many “genetically altered”
subjects together we must consider other events. One of the probable
causes of these genetically altered subjects must be researched in
the Fukushima nuclear нdisaster.”